You've said this quite a few times in several different threads and in different ways. On the basis of exactly what evidence do you think that any universities or professors are making even the slightest "allowance," whatsoever, when it comes to students submitting work that they paid someone to write for them?

I'm sorry, but that's a very silly argument and comparison. There's a huge difference between receiving academic "help" at home and handing in an essay (or anything else) actually written by your parents. What do you suppose would happen if a student expressed your exact reasoning and said to a professor: "Professor, this semester, I just had too many papers to complete, too many projects to submit, too many lectures to attend, and too many real life problems to deal with; so, I hope you don't mind that I paid someone to write this essay for me."? By your argument, the professor would have no problem with that. Is that really what you believe? Obviously, if someone submits a purchased essay for academic credit, that's the definition of academic dishonesty. My clients are adults who make their own decisions and I don't ask them how they intend to use my work, because it's really none of my business; I'm a writer, not an academic-honesty policeman. My clients own whatever they pay me to write and what they choose to do with it is entirely their concern. But let's not make silly arguments that handing in something written by someone else for academic credit "isn't" the very definition of academic dishonesty.

When I started writing for companies in 2003, I didn't really give much thought to working for myself, mainly, because I just didn't think it was a realistic goal. I was fairly content to work (mostly) for companies even though they take a substantial middleman's cut, partly because they handle most of the customer-service tasks and advertising for new customers. It wasn't until my reputation grew and my private clientele started expanding that I realized it was actually quite possible for me to work entirely independently. The final straw that motivated me to make the transition to writing exclusively on my own was when the main company for which I'd been writing actually lowered their existing payout for most projects about 10 years ago, instead of raising it. They did this indirectly by re-categorizing projects; but the result was that almost all of the same types of projects that I'd been writing for them since 2003 paid less per page than before.

More than half of my clients request UK English. Some of us US writers have absolutely no problem writing UK English (and vice-versa). However, I have to tell you that there's no difference, in sentence structure, whatsoever, between US and UK English. The only differences are in some vocabulary, spelling, and idiomatic expression, all of which can be learned easily by any good writer. There are no differences in source requirements, either: whether they're US or UK projects, they usually just specify a citation style and the types of sources that are required. For example, "MLA or OSCOLA style and only primary sources and peer-reviewed journals no older than 2016" is the same regardless of whether it's a US or UK project. In most cases, UK and US materials are equally easy to find online if you know what you're doing; and in situations where specialized materials are required, we just rely on our clients to provide them.

I know nothing about this company; but this is actually completely standard throughout this entire industry among just about all legitimate companies and writers, and it makes complete sense. Revisions are always free if we deviate from the specific instructions provided for the order; but I know of no company or writer who will provide free revisions if the completed project fulfilled the project specs provided by the client at the time of the order. Sometimes, clients change their minds about what they want after receiving their completed projects; other times, they realize only after the fact that they accidentally left something out and failed to give us the full requirements for their projects. The very simple rule that just about all legitimate essay providers follow is "my mistake/my problem; your mistake/your problem." What that means is simply that we'll always provide a free revision if we're the one who made the mistake and that the client always pays for the revision if the client is the one who made the mistake. I have no idea what you could possibly think is wrong with that, much less why you'd consider that an indication that a company shouldn't be trusted.

It could be worse: they could have posted the full names of their clients in "testimonials" the way at least one of the other companies that was the subject of recent discussion here did.

As I recently suggested in a very similar thread, the typical M.O. of scam companies is to close and re-open under a new name as soon as they get publicly outted as scams. The constant changing of their company names is an essential part of their "business model"; and they probably register many different company names and websites well in advance for exactly this purpose. That's why it's important to consider the length of time that any service provider has been operating under the same name, whether it's an essay company or an independent freelance writer.

There's 0.0% chance that the company described will "change" or "learn from experience." The details in Post #4 above make that very obvious. Any legitimate (or legitimately-intentioned) company would have, at the very least, immediately issued a full refund to retain customer goodwill, if, let's imagine, it were merely a matter of one bad writer having slipped through the cracks in their hiring process. Instead, they exhibited all of the typical scam-company responses to that customer's complaint, such as offering only a 40% refund for an 80% plagiarized, 100% useless piece of work, and then failing to actually issue even that inadequate refund as promised several months later after numerous promises about issuing it within "5 days." That's not a company that's ever going to be "changing" or "learning" anything, except, possibly, how to re-open another total scam company under a new name faster than last time.

I'm sure they immediately created another identical business under a new name. That's why it's so difficult for students who are unfamiliar with the nature of this industry to find legit providers: as soon as a company gets shut down or revealed as a scam, the owners just create another one.

As I've previously mentioned a few times, except for a moderate reduction in orders in between February and May of 2020, I really haven't noticed much of a change attributable to the pandemic. Once everybody who had been attending school in person when the pandemic hit transitioned to remote classes, the demand for my work returned right back to normal pre-pandemic patterns.

How do they prevent customers and writers from cutting the company out, altogether, once they're in direct contact?

That's obviously the case for writers whose main gig is in traditional academia and/or in certain other industries and/or countries; but I've always been extremely open about what I do and probably >90% of my clients and I know one another's real identities. It used to be on my resume, and when I first interviewed for my old job in federal government, we discussed it during my interview. It certainly provided evidence that I can work well under intense deadline pressure and juggle multiple overlapping deadlines.

Before I went completely independent, I wrote for some of the biggest and best US/UK essay companies. None of them displayed any writer profiles or gave customers the option of picking specific writers based on a writer's profile. I've heard (from other writers) about some legit platforms that do that; but from what I've seen (mostly looking at sites mentioned on this forum), the companies with writer "profiles" and those little ID photos of writers were all obvious scams and those profiles were all obvious fakes, as were all of their posted "reviews" from "customers."

I agree, even though I do pay to advertise here. The most important evidence that someone is legit is how long that person has been here under the same S/N. Someone operating under the same S/N for more than a decade without a single complaint about the quality of his work (or about ripping anybody off, obviously) couldn't possibly be a scam.

Then just ignore and delete their future emails. Don't respond any further or continue letting them think they have any leverage over you. It's a very common blackmail scam; but they're not actually going to do anything unless you really antagonize them. Just ghost them; ideally, put a block on their emails so that you don't even see them. If you can, set up an auto-response that lets them know you're not even seeing their emails. After that, forget about them except in so far as having learned a lesson about using those kinds of companies. Use this forum to find a trustworthy provider next time.

I will give you a 100% guarantee that they will never issue any refund, regardless of what their "guarantee" says. Everything they tell you about contacting your school is a threat intended to intimidate you so that you don't pursue a refund. If you never disclosed your school, just contact your credit card company and send them a link to their guarantee along with their emails in response to your refund request. Also, post the name of the company right here to help out future potential victims.

If you did actually disclose your school (and/or if it's easily searchable by your name and payment info), just chalk it up to a lesson learned and don't antagonize them into actually sending your previous projects to someone at your school for spiteful revenge. Either way, you should just ignore their emails and use this forum to identify a qualified writer for the next time you need work. Use the search function here to search all of the existing information on this far-from-unique dilemma; search for "blackmail" and "refund" and "guarantee." (Always change the default "Titles" to "Messages" so that your search results aren't limited to threads with your search term in the thread title.)

Thank you. I wouldn't really characterize it as taking "pains," though; because when you know that all of your writing comes straight from your own mind, you don't have to worry about whether or not you're writing something that's original. One thing that I find myself having to explain to some new clients who ask me whether I include free plagiarism scans with their essays is that writers don't need to use plagiarism scanners unless they know that they're in the habit of paraphrasing from (uncredited) sources instead of actually writing something of their own. Writers who need to use plagiarism scanners are fully aware that they're just rewriting existing material and just trying to change it enough to pass for original writing. The only exception is that when you've already written about the same topic many times, it's possible to write something that's almost identical to what you've written before. So, I've learned to check my old projects on similar topics before finalizing them, just in case.

Chances are that their first searches are probably just for academic essay companies, which direct them to some of the very legit-looking websites of the countless scam companies in this industry. They probably don't even start Googling essay companies + "scam" until after they've already been ripped off, because when they placed their first order, they simply had no idea that the majority of companies and "writers" in this industry are totally unqualified at best and outright scams at worst. By the time they reach out to me in desperation, some of my clients have already tried and wasted a lot of money on totally unusable ESL trash from one or two other companies and/or writers with a heavy online advertising presence and/or in response to direct solicitation on Facebook or Twitter. A few of my clients were actually ripped off three times by the time they found me.

Actually, I don't think most of them have any idea at all that their projects will be written by ESL writers, because they're fooled by flashy websites and don't really read them closely enough to spot all the obvious indications that they're dealing with ESL organizations. They just figure that any company with a nice-looking automated website must be legit and they get sucked in by their suprisingly-cheap prices. It isn't until they receive their projects written in unusably-bad ESL "English" that they realize why their prices are so low. Then, many of them eventually come to someone like me after already having wasted money on one or two different "cheaper" services. By that time, they're often very skittish and hesitant to trust me at all, and I have to waste time explaining that they're not going to have a similar experience with me and (sometimes) pointing out to them some of the obvious indications of ESL writing on the websites of the companies that ripped them off. Most of them don't even find this forum until after getting ripped off once or twice, or even three times, first.

Apparently, one of the services that they can't provide is writing very simple online forum posts in grammatically-correct English.

I have a very hard time believing that anybody who hopes to work as an academic writer actually thinks that an advertisement about work with a "flexible work schedule" means that it's the deadlines specified for projects themselves that are "flexible." As a practical matter, though, most deadlines set by clients do have cushions on the clients' end of things, for obvious reasons. Even the best academic writers in this business might sometimes ask a client whether a deadline can be extended, but whenever we do that, we also make it clear that we can still meet the original deadline, if necessary, and we never wait until shortly before the original deadline to ask. The most common reason we might sometimes inquire about a possible deadline extension is simply that we're trying to accommodate another client's need for a rush project on very short notice. If the first client indicates that there's no cushion on the deadline, we have no choice but to prioritize that prior deadline and let the second client know that the rush request can't be accommodated. However, much more often than not, the first client responds "Sure, no problem...how much more time do you need?" or "I can give you up to three more days" or something else along those lines.

I know nothing about the company; but when companies say "flexible work schedule," they obviously mean that writers can choose for themselves when to work and what projects to take. I don't think they're suggesting that the deadlines of projects are "flexible" on the writer's side.

Phone (and other in-person) "conferencing" is nothing but a marketing mechanism, at best, and just another part of a con game, at worst. I've written at least 10,000 projects in the last 20 years and I can count on one hand (with several fingers left) how many times a project has required a real-time conversation with the client. If a legit company advertises phone (or other real-time media) conferences, it's just a marketing gimmick; and if a scam company advertises conferences with its writers, the purpose is just to gain the confidence of prospective customers. Typically, the customer doesn't ever actually talk to any "writer" because the person on the other end of the line is part of the marketing team whose job it is to gain the customer's confidence and trust. This forum is filled with examples of real-time "chat" logs between customers and company reps and "writers." The one thing they all have in common is the immediate change from polite helpfulness to rude evasiveness (and abrupt termination) the instant the customer has any kind of complaint about the project or tries to cancel it, even minutes after placing an order.

I know nothing about the company, but it's ludicrous to consider its name to be an "unfounded claim" or a "guarantee" of anything.

Agreed.

The essay company for which I did the most work actually paid us by paper checks sent through the USPS. They eventually stopped doing this, but for many years, they also charged every writer $10/month for "check processing fees" which was probably illegal.

To my knowledge, one major flaw in the system was that customers received an order "confirmation" as soon as their payments went through; but that confirmation only meant that the order had been accepted by the system and posted on the internal assignment board for writers to consider taking. I don't think customers had any idea that the initial "confirmation" didn't mean that any writer had actually taken the order or that the order might never actually be taken by any writer before its posted deadline.


The vast majority of the time, writers had no communication with customers, at all: typically, we just took orders off the board and submitted them by their deadline according to all of the specifications in the order. Sometimes, there were messages about the order posted by the customer; other times, we might send a message to the customer if we had questions or if anything about the order was unclear. In any case, most orders didn't require any messages and it was never appropriate for customers to make any kind of requests or to add any specifications to any order through messages, because companies price all orders and calculate the payout offered to writers based on whatever was actually ordered (no more and no less), and writers take orders relying exclusively on whatever information is included in the original order, not based on any additional information or specifications sent subsequently through messages.

Customers sometimes tried to under-pay by adding information such as "This 4-page order is for 4 single-spaced pages" or "I really need this delivered 24 hours earlier than the deadline," or "The 10 sources requested must all be annotated," in which case, we writers would have to respond by messaging back that the TOS clearly said that projects were billed as double-spaced pages, that the writer's deadline was always whatever was actually posted on the order, and that only regular (non-annotated) bibliographies were free, because annotations require additional writing. I also learned to inform the customer in those situations that I couldn't start their projects until they responded confirming that they still wanted it, because I didn't need any headaches from clients who decided that they preferred to cancel their orders rather than paying for everything they needed, only after I'd already wasted my time doing any work on it. If those projects had rush deadlines, I also let them know that any time burned off by their delay responding would have to be added to my deadline.


In my experience, even when company systems do notify customers when their projects have been taken by a writer, the problem is that, to my knowledge, nothing informs customers that their projects won't actually be in progress unless or until a specific writer takes the project. So, when orders hang on the assignment board for days (or weeks), those customers have no idea that nobody has taken their projects, yet. All they know is that they received an order "confirmation" shortly after payment; so, they have no way of knowing that their orders might sit on the assignment board, still untaken by any writer, for days or even weeks.


In my experience, this was always the case, because there were almost always expired orders on the boards, sometimes for several weeks. We weren't supposed to take expired orders without first contacting CS; but I learned to get answers quicker by simply messaging the customers to ask whether they still wanted their projects by whatever date and time I was prepared to deliver them.

That happens at essay companies, as well: Typically, orders that don't get taken by any writer just stay on the assignment boards for days, often long after their deadlines have come and gone. Legit companies do eventually get around to deleting them and refunding those customers; but that doesn't really help them that much, especially if they think that their projects are in progress all of that time. Years ago, I used to check the company boards for customers who were also members of this forum, just to let them know whether or not their projects were still listed, because they had no other way of knowing whether their projects had actually been taken by any writer.

Thank you, I appreciate that. Yes, I've always maintained a good relationship with my legitimate competitors, most of whom wrote for the same essay companies as I used to around the time that we all first joined this forum in 2007 or 2008. While I don't actually negotiate on pricing, I'm definitely easy to communicate with for most clients. The exceptions would be prospective clients who don't bother reading FAQs, and/or who think that my FAQs only apply to other clients, and/or who don't understand that someone who's been in (any kind of) business for decades already has his own processes and ways of doing business and that clients (of any business) just need to follow whatever those processes are for things to go as smoothly as possible.

It shouldn't take more than 10 minutes using nothing more than the search function on this forum.

Chances are that his post represents better "English" than most of the work they actually provide, because they usually use their best writers for marketing.

Thank you, but my PM privileges were restored shortly after that 2010 post. On the other hand, the last thing that I'd do is mention the names of the essay companies for which I used to write for two reasons:

(1) I received a notice from this forum back in 2010 that my membership was going to be terminated because the owners thought that I was here just to promote those companies. They allowed me to stay here on the condition that I never mention them again and I've abided by that agreement ever since.

(2) I haven't written for any essay company since 2013; so I have no interest in promoting any company that is now just another direct competitor for the same clients. I still maintain a good relationship with them and my writer's account is still active (I just checked) and I refer projects their way once in a while, but I don't mention them here by name.

I wasn't offended. I'm just suggesting that it's not helpful to suggest or imply that it's appropriate to assume that "all essay writing sites are good until proven otherwise" when anybody with experience in this industry knows that the truth is much closer to the exact opposite of that assumption. That's also why I'm not offended when new prospective clients want to test me with a short project or a very short section of a larger project before trusting me with a larger project. This is a totally unregulated industry in which the vast majority of providers who purport to be trustworthy are incompetent at best and much more likely to be outright scamming frauds than entities deserving the benefit of doubt "until proven otherwise."

Just check out his website: It's even worse than his forum post.

I happen to know for an absolute fact that this isn't true at all, because, as an essay-company writer, I took more than a few projects that consisted of completely redoing essays that customers had to reorder because they'd been so badly butchered by ESL writers employed by the same companies. Much more recently (as in just a few months ago), I referred work to some American essay companies for clients with highly technical projects that were out of my range of expertise, and the little bit of writing required in between the calculations were very obviously (quite bad) ESL English.

I completely disagree. This is a totally unregulated industry in which there are hundreds and hundreds of fraudulent sites for every legitimate provider. So, I'd suggest considering the possibility that every company and untested writer is a scam until they prove otherwise by delivering good work.

There are actually plenty of free term papers searchable online; they're just not worth very much, because they've undoubtedly been downloaded countless times, already.

Why would you post your dissertation topic on a public forum like this before you've completed it, especially if you're planning on writing it yourself?

While I do appreciate the suggestion, I'd hardly need to recruit any other writers just to produce 4 papers in 3 weeks. I usually write at least one or two projects every day unless I take a day off; so 4 papers of ordinary undergraduate length and difficulty represents only about 2 or 3 days of work for me (and 4 days, at most, if they're 10+ pages, each, and I'm not in a rush), not 3 weeks. During the busiest seasons, I can end up writing up to twice that much on (nearly) a daily basis.

"Fully plagiarized" and "low-level" English are hardly mutually exclusive, because I've seen plenty of terrible essays that exhibited both extensive plagiarism and horrible ESL writing in the same essay. First, "fully plagiarized" doesn't necessarily mean that literally every single word was plagiarized; in fact, that's very uncommon, because even when writing is nothing more than plagiarized work, the writer (whether a paid writer or a student) typically does still add some original sentences in between plagiarized passages. Other times, they make minor changes to the plagiarized material, whether in an attempt to tailor it to the topic or in a failed attempt to make the plagiarism less obvious. If an essay consists of large chunks of plagiarized material connected by a little bit of original verbiage, I'd still consider that "fully plagiarized" even if "substantially plagiarized" or "almost fully plagiarized" would be a more accurate description. Second, and more to the point, I've also seen essays that were substantially plagiarized or essentially "fully plagiarized" and that also exhibited bad ESL writing simultaneously. That can happen anytime the writer plagiarizes from old published academic essays that were originally written in bad ESL English or anytime an ESL writer plagiarizes from better sources but adds in some of his own changes and/or writing in between all of the plagiarized material.